Self Discovery
by Abbil
Summary: A rabid fan girl is given a chance for self growth by being sent to the LOK universe for one night. If knowledge is power, why does she keep dying? Stupid title, starts out a little slow, but hopefully gets better.
1. It Begins

As I said in the summary, it's gonna start out a bit slow, so I apologize in advance. Also, I do have a healthy fear of Ouija boards and refuse to ever use one, so I apologize for any mistakes made on that front, as well. Well, enjoy!

* * *

"Crys, I don't like this. It's a bad idea and we're gonna end up cursed or dead or somethin'! Please, _please _put the Ouija board away!"

This is how it all started; my favorite dream turned into my worst nightmare. And it wasn't even my fault!

Meet my friend Crystal, also known as Crys. She's pretty and smart, gets dates, and is all around perfect... and she's been getting me into trouble every chance she gets for the last decade. We met in 3rd period Spanish; the teacher paired us up to make an authentic Mexican dish. We hit it off right away, which surprised me since she's... well... perfect... And I'm... uh... not. My hair has been blue ever since I got this bad dye job in junior high, I got my nose broken in kindergarten and it never set right, and let's not get into the blobs of fat. But still, she was as big a dork as I am, and managed to make me like her despite all odds.

Of course, it wasn't until after we became friends that _she _set the home ec room on fire trying to make quesadillas, and I'm the one who ended up with detention. But, all this is meaningless.

The important thing is, I was staying over at her house for the weekend and she was about to screw me over again. You see, she's the adventurous type who has to try everything once, and she had found her older sister's Ouija board stuck back in a closet. I have a healthy respect (or fear) of the beyond, and didn't want to mess with powers beyond my control. Crys, however... Crys won't take no for an answer.

I tried reasoning with her.

"You don't even know how it works. Why don't you put it away until you can look stuff up... and I'm safely away. I mean, we're already in our pj's, we've got the mud-masks on... I wanna just go to bed."

I tried scare tactics.

"You never know what these things are going to attract! Haven't you watched Rose Red? The channel is too wide, bad things come out, blah, blah, blah."

I even resorted to begging!

Never mind, you don't need to hear that.

Anyway, nothing worked. She was bound and determined to play with the thing, and ignored my every whining plea. She wouldn't even let me leave the room while she did it, so I had to sit right there while she pulled out all the little pieces and parts and set them out as best she could figure. With a resigned sigh, I helped her "call the spirits."

It didn't take long for an odd feeling to come over me. The hair on the back of my neck stood straight up, I broke out in a cold sweat, and my teeth started chattering. Nothing was happening on the board, much to Crys' disappointment, but I _knew_ something was there. Something... unpleasant. Still, there was no reaction that Crys could see, so she quickly lost interest and started putting things away.

"Um, aren't you supposed to do something to shut it off or something, Crys? You know, tell the spirits to go away and stuff?" I was shaking so bad, I'm surprised she understood me, but understand me she did. Rolling her eyes, she started trying to placate me like I was a scared little girl who thought there was a monster in her closet.

"It's not like we got anything, anyway. Besides, I'm sure my sis would have mentioned it at some point or another. She was always talking about her mystic crap. Quit being such a chickenshit!" I hate it when she does that...

Still, I couldn't think of anything to say that would convince her, so I gave up. I even tried to tell myself she was right.

_You're just being silly... You probably didn't get anything, just like she said. You're just scaring yourself for nothing... Surely they wouldn't sell the blasted things to teenagers if they were that dangerous..._

I almost managed to convince myself before I went to sleep.

Later that night, I woke to this terrible moaning sound. My eyes popped open before I could stop myself, and I saw a shadowy figure in the dim light from the bathroom. "Crys?" My voice wavered; I sounded pathetically whiny even to my own ears.

I whimpered softly as a distinctively masculine voice answered.

"No."

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Like it? Hate it? Either way, let me know. I need some constructive criticism so I can do better next time. 


	2. Well, that's a great start

I froze.

_Run! Scream! Do __something__, stupid!_ My brain was working at the speed of light, but I couldn't so much as blink. The figure moved closer, and I found that as it did I could make out more of it's appearance.

Coldly handsome features sneered at me from his face, lit by a chilling purplish light.

Suddenly able to move again, I dove under the covers and began to chant, "not there not there not there not there not th-EEEP!"

The apparition had yanked the blankets away and was now scowling down at me even more fiercely than before. I trembled violently as he spoke.

"You are weak. You have shamefully squandered the gift of life. For this, you shall be punished."

"W-wha-what d-do you m-m-mean?" I stammered, terrified. "I h-haven't d-done anyth-thing!"

His scowl only deepened at my words. "That is exactly why, you cringing cowardly waste of humanity! You have done nothing! You slink and whine your way through life, always taking the path of least resistance, never making any effort to be anything more than you are now. Well, all that is about to change. You will be given one last chance to redeem yourself; I will test your spirit and strength of will. If you fail in this, your soul will be cast adrift in the endless nothingness between this world and the next. I, in turn, will inhabit your body and attempt to set aright the waste of your life."

I could hardly believe my ears! I new I was flawed, but such a harsh summary of my life stung. Still, I had more important matters to worry about; namely, the banishment of my very soul. Still, If I had a chance, I needed to take it. I swallowed hard, tried my best to ignore the nagging voice in the back of my head that told me there was no way I could succeed, and said, 

"Wh-what do I h-have t-to d-d-do?"

"Let's see..." He raised his transparent fingers up in front of my face. They hovered there for a moment, then began to glow a bit brighter.

As they did, I could feel a strange and entirely unpleasant sensation in my head. It was almost as if he was wandering around freely in there, searching through my every thought and feeling, turning things upside down or tossing them around as he saw fit. Helpless to stop this violation, I could only sit there in horror and disgust as he rummaged through the entirety of my consciousness.

After what seemed like an eternity, he pulled away with a large and disturbing grin on his ghostly face.

"A fangirl! Lovely! Your punishment shall be to be placed in your favorite video game, as you are now, for one night. _If_ you have survived until the morning, I will give you back your body and your pathetic excuse for a life. If not, you will have failed your test and it will be off to the void with you."

At first , I was puzzled. "How is that a test? It's just..." Then it hit me. "Oh. Vampires. Demons. Saraphan. Raziel. _Kain_.

...Shit."

Even as the last word left my mouth, I felt my very being begin to fade away.

I came back to myself in the middle of the Saraphan stronghold, absolutely full of vampire hunters, and with Moebius most likely lurking around somewhere. And - lucky me - standing right in front of a rather _large_, rather _unfriendly_ looking man.

"Demon!" He bellowed. Before I had the chance to even open my mouth to explain that I was, in fact, _not _a demon, he was already swinging a hammer that looked like it weighed more than I did right at my head.

Call me a chicken, but I closed my eyes before it hit me. I just really didn't want to see myself become another puddle of blood on the floor.

My death was quick, painful, and quite messy. As my soul fled my doomed body, I saw the gore splash all over the walls, floor, and ceiling. Luckily for me, I didn't have a stomach to empty at the time. As I faded into the green, twisted version of reality that was the spectral realm, I noticed a strange pull on my spirit. I let it carry me along for a moment while I tried to figure out what could be causing it.

Then I remembered.

Pull Wheel. Wheel Squid. Squid bad.

With this realization, I began fighting the current. It turned out that, with a little effort, I could resist the pull, though I continued to feel its insistent tug. Now I was dead, in Nosgoth, and with no conveniently benevolent god to bring me back. I could only think of one thing to say about this development.

"Now what?"

* * *

I'm not happy with this chapter at all. It seemed like pure genius when I was writing it, but that was rather late at night and I was hopped up on chocolate covered espresso beans. Not the best of conditions for writing anything but random comedy stuff. Maybe I should have been working on Soul Stripper instead...

Any suggestions on how to repair it would be greatly appreciated.


	3. 6 hours left

"Do-doo, do-do-di-doo..."

I floated along the hallways aimlessly, still not quite sure what to do next. The demon, or ghost, or _whatever_he was had cheated and sent me directly into a no-win situation, so I was as good as toast. Still, I had around 6 hours or so to kill. My last 6 hours in existence... and I had absolutely _no _idea what to do with them.

At first I had considered just giving up; sitting on the floor and sobbing like a lost child until my time was up. I decided instead that if, as I had been told, I had been just drifting through life, I should at least do something different with my death. Thus, I found myself wandering around with no real plan beyond doing something exciting.

Thus far, the trip had been less than memorable.

I had somehow managed to get myself lost in the dungeons, where I could see all sorts of nasty torture devices no matter which way I looked. As if being dead wasn't disturbing enough...

Soon, I began to notice a new pull on my spirit. Curious, I followed it. Cautiously, of course; this was still Nosgoth, after all. It didn't take long for the _smell_ to hit; a foul stench that got stronger the closer I came to the source of the tug. When I finally reached the place where the pull (and the stink) was strongest, I realized I had been tracking a corpse. A very _decayed_corpse. The sight of its hand poking out through the dirt gave me not only an acute case of nausea, but also an idea.

"It worked for Raziel.." I shrugged my non-shoulders and decided to give it a shot.

Raz may have had an easy time of it, but the process of willing oneself back into reality is much more difficult for the average person. First, I had to figure out how to get my spirit into the corpse. In the end, I had to actually lay down on the very spot and picture myself melting through the dirt and into the body itself.

That done, I had to dig myself out before I suffocated and had to start over. This one _could_ have been much worse... at least it was a shallow grave.

Then came the worst part of the whole process; taking the decayed carcass that I was wearing and making it look like me. It took me close to a quarter hour of intense concentration to finally change things around, and then another ten minutes to clean off the rotting skin.

Still, all in all, it was a valuable experience. It not only gave me another chance, it also showed me what I could do if I really tried. I didn't have time to enjoy the sense of accomplishment, though. I was still lost in the Saraphan Stronghold.

I set off wandering again, this time physically there and thus far more vulnerable. Every time I even _thought_I heard something, I dove into the nearest hiding place. Go ahead, laugh. It may seem funny to you to see someone jump headfirst into a closet because of a squirrel, bit I would rather look like an idiot than a grease spot.

While waiting for a pair of guards to pass me by, I thought about the events which had led to my recent demise. _Why did that guy call me a demon? I don't look like a demon, do I? I didn't last time I checked... I remember looking in the mirror last night to put on that silly mud... Oh._

Of course. The mud-mask, blue hair, and lip ring didn't look very human by Nosgothian standards. If I could just wash up, change, and do something about my hair, I could maybe make it through this a bit easier. Maybe without getting squished again.

Once I was free to move again, I ducked into the next room. There, I found enough to pull of a basic disguise, if barely. With a little imagination, a cloak became a skirt, my pajama bottoms became a kerchief for my hair, and a puddle of water became a sink. After all that, and removing my piercings, I felt ready to brave Nosgoth once more.

Of course, now that I was prepared, I didn't run into anyone at all. It was like they had all just disappeared at once! I was a little disappointed I couldn't try out my new disguise, but the biggest part of me was glad I didn't have to worry about it not working.

I wandered around until I found myself in a place that looked vaguely familiar. I hadn't been in this part of the stronghold myself, so I must have seen it in one of the games. Which one, though?

"How do I get out from here?" I mused aloud. And, wouldn't you know it, the minute I opened my mouth I ran into a very tall blond woman who looked no friendlier than my first acquaintance had been.

She promptly opened her mouth wide and began screaming, "Intruder! Get her!" at the top of her lungs. I took this as my cue to run.

"_Please_ don't be a sorceress! _Please_ don't be a sorceress! _Please_don't- Uhn!!" I fell to floor, my chant and my escape interrupted by a half-dozen balls of light slamming me in the back and side. "Great!" I spat, climbing back to my feet as fast as I could. "Perfect! A friggin' sorceress." I ran full out, hoping I could find some way to lose her and the three friends she had picked up on the way.

Just ahead, I saw daylight streaming out of an open door. _Thank God! There are more hiding places outside and a distinct lack of dead-end rooms outside!_

My relief was short lived.

I skidded to a stop just before I would have plunged head first over the edge of a balcony. Far, far below, I saw a lake glinting in the sunlight. _I'd rather not... _I turned around, hoping to find another path, but the sorceress and her posse were right on my tail and closing in. I looked from them to the lake and back again, but made my choice when I saw the blond start to gesture wildly.

I swallowed hard and leapt over the edge, screaming all the way.

"Tawandaaaa!!"

* * *

I love _Fried Green Tomatoes_, don't you? Anyway, I've reached a couple of decisions. 1, there will be six more chapters of this insanity. Five of the whiny lady's adventures in Nosgoth, and one for the epilogue. 2, unless I start getting reviews, I'm not going to post them. I'll send them to Dragonaia, but until I get three reviews for this chapter, the rest will just be for my own amusement. That's the main reason I write anyway; the only reason I put things on this site is to get some tips on how to develop my writing style. If I'm not getting it, I don't see any reason to waste my time typing all this out and uploading it. I don't mean to sound grouchy, but I really don't have enough time on the computer to go to all that trouble if I don't get anything back.


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